Kenzo’s California Dreaming

Kenzo creative directors Carol Lim and Humberto Leon are both California natives. The duo met while they were undergrads at UC Berkeley and, after establishing global cool-kid emporium Opening Ceremony in 2002, signed on to take over the Paris-based label in 2011. While they’ve stayed true to founder Kenzo Takada’s vision—namely, in bold and playful takes on vivid color, prints, and pumped-up proportions—since they took the reins at Kenzo, Leon and Lim haven’t been afraid of their West Coast roots, as evidenced by the brand’s Spring/Summer 2014 collection.

Leon and Lim took the cause of overfishing in California as their main directive for Kenzo’s S/S 2014 collection, which included a remix of roomy surf culture silhouettes, a fresh palette of blues and greens, and streaky wave-like motifs and fish prints in various sizes and scales. When it came time to develop a film for the collection, Leon and Lim tapped L.A.-based filmmaker Kahlil Joseph, who helmed the music videos for Flying Lotus’ “Until the Quiet Comes” and Shabazz Palaces’ “Black Up,” to direct. The result is Dawn at Luxor, which Interview is thrilled to exclusively premiere above.

In the film, Joseph presents a fragmented and surrealistic collection of images meditating on the sensory experiences of Los Angeles: a woman overlooking serene vistas of the ocean, a man ordering fish in a Jamaican restaurant, and a boy and a beached dolphin. Stars Grace Mahary, Palaceer Lazar, Chris Lewis, and Tykee Dawkins are outfitted in Kenzo’s Spring/Summer wares, but the clothes, rather than appearing as pure fashion, merge seamlessly with the dreamlike world Joseph creates.